The Philosophy of Teaching, 



K> 33 (o, (j- 



THE TEACHER, 



THE PUPIL, THE SCHOOL. 



BY 



NATHANIEL SANDS. 




NEW YORK: 



HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 

FRANKLIN SQUARE. 
1869. 

a 






Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year iS6g, by 

HARPER & BROTHERS, 

In tlie Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the 

Southern District of New York. 



TEACHER AND PUPIL. 



THE TEACHER, THE PUPH, THE 
SCHOOL. 

TEACHER AND PUPIL. 

OF the various callings to which the division of 
labor has caused man specially to devote him- 
self, there is none to be compared for nobility or use- 
fulness with that of the true teacher. Yet neither 
teachers nor people at present realize this truth. 

Among the very few lessons of value which might 
be derived from so-called "classical" studies, is that 
of the proper estimate in which the true teacher 
should be held ; for among the Greeks no calling or 
occupation was more honored. Yet with a strange 
perversity, albeit for centuries the precious time of 
youth has been wasted, and the minds and morals of 
the young perverted by " classical " studies, this one 
lesson has been disregarded. 

"What duty can be more responsible, what voca- 
tion more holy, than that of training the young in 
habits of industry, truthfulness, economy, and sobrie- 
ty ; of giving to them that knowledge and skill with- 
out which their lives would become a burden to 
themselves and to society ? Yet, while the merchant 



6 Teachee and Pupil. 

seeks to exercise the greatest caution in selecting the 
persons to whom he intrusts his merchandise, and 
yields respect to him who faithfully performs his 
commercial engageriients. he makes but scant inquiry 
as to the character or qualifications of the mind- 
builder upon whose skill, judgment, and trustworthi- 
ness the future of his children will greatly depend. 

The position assigned by our social rules to the 
teacher accords, not with the nobility of his func- 
tions, but with the insufiicient appreciation entertain- 
ed of them by the people, and is accompanied by a 
corresponding inadequate remuneration. And what 
is the result? Except a few single-hearted, noble 
men and women, by whom the profession of the 
teacher is illustrated and adorned ; except a few self- 
sacrificinsf heroes and heroines whose love of children 
and of mankind reconciles them to an humble lot and 
ill-requited labors, the class of school-teachers through- 
out the whole civilized world barely reaches the level 
of that mediocrity which in all other callings suffices 
to obtain not merely a comfortable maintenance in 
the present, but a provision against sickness and for 
old age. 

What aspiring father, what Cornelia among moth- 
ers, select for their children the profession of a teach- 
er as a field in which the talents and just ambition of 
such children may find scope? Nor can we hope for 
any improvement until a justcr appreciation of the 
nobility of the teacher's vocation, and a more gener- 
ous remuneration of his labors shall generally prevail. 

It is to the desire to aid somewhat in bringing 
about a juster appreciation in the minds alike of 
teachers and of people of the utility and nobleness of 



Teacher and Pupil. 7 

the teacher's labors and vocation that these pages owe 
their origin. 

When we consider the nature of the Being over 
whose future the teacher is to exercise so great an in- 
fluence, whose mind he is to store with knowledge, 
and whom he is to train in the practice of such con- 
duct as shall lead to his happiness and well-being, we 
are lost in amazement at the extent of the knowledge 
and perfection of the moral attributes which should 
have been acquired by the teacher. It is his duty to 
make his pupils acquainted with that nature of which 
they form a part, by which they are surrounded, and 
which is " rubbing against them at every step in life." 
But he can not teach that of which he himself is ig- 
norant. Every science then may in turn become 
necessary or desirable to be employed as an instruct- 
ive agent, every art may be made accessory to illus- 
trate some item of knowledge or to elucidate some 
moral teaching. 

Man is his subject, and with the nature of that 
subject and of his surroundings he must be acquaint- 
ed, that the object to be attained and the means for 
its attainment may be known to him. 

What is man? What are his powers, what is his 
destiny, and for what purpose and for what object 
was he created ? Let us enter the laboratory of the 
chemist and commence our labors. Let us take down 
the crucible and begin the analysis, and endeavor to 
solve this important problem. In studying the great 
Cosmos we perceive each being seeking its happiness 
according to the instincts implanted in him by the 
Creator, and only in man we see his happiness made 
dependent on the extent to which he contributes to 



8 Teacher and Pupil. 

the happiness of others. What, so far as we can see, 
would this earth be without any inhabitants ? What 
great purpose in the economy of nature could it 
serve ? A palace without a king, a house without an 
occupant, a lonely and tenantless world, while we 
now see it framed in all its beauty for the enjoyment 
of happiness. 

The Being upon whom the art and science of the 
teacher is to be exercised is one to whom food, cloth- 
ing, fuel, and shelter are needful ; possessed of organs 
of digestion, whose functions should be made familiar 
to their possessor; of breathing organs, to whose 
healthful exercise pure air is essential ; a being full 
of life and animation, locomotive — desirous of mov- 
ing from place to place ; an emotional being, suscepti- 
ble to emotions of joy and sorrow, love and hate, 
hope and fear, reverence and contempt, and whose 
emotions should be so directed that their exercise 
should be productive of happiness to others. He is 
also an intellectual being, provided with senses by 
which to receive impressions and acquire a knowl- 
edge of external things; with organs of comparison 
and of reason, by which to render available for future 
use the impressions received through the senses in 
the past. Lastly : he is also a social being, to whom 
perpetual solitude would be intolerable; sympathiz- 
ing in the pains and pleasures of others, needing their 
protection, sympathy and co-operation for his own 
comfort, and desirous of conferring protection upon 
and of co-operating with them. But, further, he is a 
being who desires to be loved and esteemed, and 
finds the greatest charm of existence in the love and 
esteem he receives ; to be loved and esteemed and 



Teacher and Pupil. 9 

cared for, lie must love, esteem and care for others, 
and be generally amiable and useful. 

Such is the Being, susceptible of pain and pleasure, 
of sorrow and joy, whom the mind-builder is to 
train up so that, as far as possible, the former may be 
averted and the latter secured. 

The teacher, then, must train him in habits of in- 
dustry and skill, that work may be pleasant and easy 
to him, and held in honorable esteem; for without 
work, skillfully performed, neither food, clothing, fuel 
nor shelter can be obtained in sufficient quantity to 
avoid poverty and suffering. Knowledge also must 
be acquired by the laborer, in order that the work 
which is to be skillfully performed may be performed 
with that attention to the conditions of mechanical, 
chemical, electrical, and vital agencies necessary to 
render labor productive. A knowledge of the con- 
ditions of mechanics, of chemistry, of electricity, and 
of vital phenomena should be imparted by the teach- 
er; and to impart this knowledge, he must first pos- 
sess it. 

How sublime, then, are the qualifications, natural 
and acquired, which the true teacher should possess ! 
How deep should be our reverence for him who, by 
his skill and knowledge, is capable, and by his moral 
qualities willing, to perform duties so onerous and so 
difficult. AVhat station in life can be regarded as 
more exalted ; whose utility can be compared with 
that of him who proves himself faithful to the duties 
he assumes, when he takes upon himself the office of 
a teacher of youth ? 

The question which is ever present to the mind of 
the true teacher is: What can I do to insure the hap- 



10 Teacher and Pupil. 

piness of these beings confided to my charge, whose 
minds it is given to me to fashion, not according to 
my will, but according as my skill and judgment 
shall, more or less, enable me to adapt my teachings 
to their natures ? What shall I seek to engrave upon 
the clear tablets of their young and tender minds, in 
order that their future lot may be a joj^ous one? 
Let me illustrate (he will say) my profession. I will 
raise it high as the most honored among men, and for 
my monument I will say: "Look around; see the 
good works of those whom I have taught and train- 
ed ; they are rny memorials !" 

Such may, such will become the hope and aspira- 
tion common to teachers in that good day to come, 
when their labors shall be honored as they deserve ; 
when parents, in all the different ranks into which 
society falls, shall vie with each other in the respect 
and honor tendered to the teacher, whose true place 
in society is at least not beneath that of the Judge. 

The teachers to be developed b}'- such a state of 
society will, as their first step, seek to obtain a clear 
and comprehensive view of the work they propose 
to accomplish, and will then seek to adopt the most 
judicious means to reach the end proposed. They 
will adapt their methods of teaching to the nature of 
the object to be taught and to the order in which the 
faculties of the human mind naturally unfold them- 
selves, for true education is the natural unfolding of 
the intellectual germ. Li order to obtain the knowl- 
edge necessary of the object to be taught, the true 
teacher turns to nature as his guide, for the voice of 
nature is the voice of God, and in reading her statutes 
we read that grand volume in which He has left an 



Teacher and Pupil. 11 

impress of Himself. The science of nature is noth- 
ing more than the ability to read and interpret cor- 
rectly the lessons taught. There was a period when 
mankind knew very little of the planet upon which 
they lived and moved and had their being ; there loas 
a time when they knew almost nothing ; and there 
will come a time when they will know almost every 
thing that can be known by finite man. The earth 
is our mother, and nature is our teacher, and if we lis- 
ten to her voice, she will lead us higher and higher 
until we will stand the master and the king in the 
glorified temple of wisdom. To reach results so 
grand and a jDOsition so exalted, our natures must un- 
fold in exact harmony with all the laws and forces 
which surround and control us from the time our ex- 
istence commences until its close. 

From the period of conception until birth the 
child draws to itself all the essential elements re- 
quired for the organization of a human being; the- 
capabilities and powers of the parent are taxed and 
called upon to contribute their material to enable na- 
ture to reproduce itself 

The child is born, and then, in a higher and more 
enlarged and more independent state of existence, 
commences drawing to itself the materials and sub- 
stances necessary for its growth and unfolding. It 
draws in its mother's milk, it draws in the air, and it 
builds up in itself the unseen forces of life. Nature, 
true to her mission, goes on unfolding the child, and 
teaches it daily and hourly the lessons best adapted 
to its condition. In a few days after it is born, its 
powers of observation begin to show signs of life and 
action, and it can distinguish light from darkness ; in 



12 Teacher AND Pupil. 

a few weeks its mother and nurse are known — in a 
few months quickened intelligence displays itself in 
all its actions ; in about twelve months it has learned 
the most difficult art of balancing itself so as to walk, 
and also to speak a few words ; at from two to two 
and a half years of age, only thirty months from 
birth, it has learned a language which it speaks, and 
has become familiar with a vast number of things sur- 
rounding it. From a state of entire ignorance it has 
in thirty months learned what would fill volumes. 
Horses, cows, pigs, dogs, toys, whips, birds, people, 
trees, houses, fruit, food, clothes, music, sounds, par- 
ents, friends, and a thousand other things are all 
familiar to it. Without professional teachers, al- 
most without effort, all this valuable and indispensa- 
ble knowledge has been acquired, through the uncon- 
scious adoption on the part of the mother of the true 
system of education — e duco — I lead forth, and hence 
nurse, cherish, build up, develop. 

The child feels or reaches out, like the tendril, to 
the material world, seeking to make itself acquainted 
with that world ; even the young infant soon begins 
to observe closely, soon knows its mother from all 
other persons, clings to her, loves her above all ; soon 
it recognizes light from darkness, sweet from bitter ; 
soon, when it sees a dog it will recognize it and jump 
with delight almost out of its mother's arms ; it will 
show an eager delight to watch the motions of the 
horse, and imitates the sounds employed by adults 
when driving. He spreads forth the tentacles of his 
feeble mind for knowledge, and his mind "grows by 
what it feeds upon," and it is for those intrusted with 
the infant's training to respond intelligent! j'- to the 



Teacher and Pupil. 13 

child's desire, to place within its reach the mental 
food adapted to its digestion, to nourish and develop 
it so that its mental hunger shall be at once gratified 
and excited anew. 

It is here, and to this end, that the able teacher 
steps in, to perfect the development of the future 
man and woman. He educates, by assisting the nat- 
ural unfolding of the intellectual germ, he places 
within reach of the child-mind the food needed to its 
2;rowth, and the child-mind reaches out its tentacles 
and absorbs the nourishment offered to it. Thus the 
mind grows from loitidn outward, and the teacher 
aids its development, as the careful husbandman by 
tilling and enriching the soil according to the nature 
of the plant he cultivates, produces a healthy and 
fruitful plant. 

The true teacher does not seek to teach by simply 
putting books into the child's hand, and bidding it to 
learn; he addresses himself to those faculties and 
powers of the child's mind, which bring it in relation 
with the world in which it lives. Sight, hearing, 
touch, smell, taste, and thence observation, judgment, 
perception, reason, memory, hope, imagination, and 
the love of the beautiful are appealed to, developed 
and strengthened by natural exercise, even as the or- 
gans and limbs of the body are developed and 
strengthened by gymnastic and other appropriate ex- 
ercises. 

Education, mental and physical, is but the Ab- 
sorption of surrounding elements into the mind and 
body — an arrangement an assimilation of materials so 
as to incorporate them into the being to whose nour- 
ishment they are applied, just as the tree or plant as- 



14 Teacher and Pupil, 

similates to its growth and subsistence the materials 
which it draws from the air and the soil. 

It is thus apparent that a great change in the sys- 
tem and principles now adopted in teaching is re- 
quired, and if we change the principles we must, of 
course, change the instruments. These are now 
adapted to the method of teaching from without in- 
ward. If we are to invert the system, and teach 
from within outward, then must our means and ap- 
pliances be adapted to this change. The task, the 
forcing process, the stuffing and cramming must all 
give way to the natural mental growth, fostered, cher- 
ished, unfolded by culture, in accord with nature and 
with law. The inquiry then arises : What are to be 
the new means and appliances for mental culture? 
We have but to turn again to Nature as our teacher 
and our guide ; her instincts are unerring. The seed 
germinates and pushes forth its root from within out- 
ward. The expansion or growth takes place by 
means of the elements which it attracts to itself, 
when these are placed within its reach, and towards 
which it stretches forth its organs. These elements 
it assimilates into and makes a part of itself This 
process of Nature, so familiar to most of us, serves to 
illustrate exactly what should take place in intellect- 
ual growth. The mind hungers and feels out for 
and is impelled by a natural internal impulse to 
gather to itself the elements of knowledge; the wise 
teacher steps forward and becomes to the germi- 
nating intellect what the sun and dew and rain are to 
the plant. The mind must be fed in conformity 
with its longings, its wants, its desires. " Blessed are 
they that hunger and thirst after righteousness." 



Teacher and Pupil. 15 

The teacher develops this hunger and thirst by stim- 
ulating inquiry, and by presenting to the mind the 
use and beauty of knowledge ; and when the mind 
gives signs that its hunger is temporarily appeased, 
that time is now required for mental digestion and 
assimilation, the wise teacher rests, and would no 
more attempt to stuff and cram the mind than the 
wise mother would seek to force food into her child's 
stomach. 

Intellectual growth of some kind, not less than 
bodily growth, whether good or evil, is constantly 
taking place. It should be the teacher's care to ren- 
der that growth a healthy one, calculated to insure 
the happiness of the subject, and, in securing his own 
happiness, to contribute to the happiness of others. 

The body being visible to the physical eye, its 
growth is also visible, and we do not think of feeling 
impatient at the long months and years required for 
it to attain its full proportions ; nor do we seek by 
any forcing process to produce a man at 10 instead 
of at 20 or 80 years of age. 

Were the mind and its growth also visible to the 
eye, we would be equally careful in our treatment of 
it. Man's first impulse in an uncivilized state has 
generally been a resort to force for the accomplish- 
ment of his objects; and as he took his first step 
forward the habits of his barbaric life remained with 
him. Hence, the first steps in teaching were by 
force — the lash, the rod, the school penal code ; but 
even as when hungry, wholesome and well-dressed 
food rejoices us, so will the mind gladly accept the 
mental food carefully prepared for it by the true 
teacher. 



16 Teacher and Pupil. 

We live in a world adapted by its Creator to our 
happiness and highest well-being. It is not only 
possible, but easy, to win from Nature all that is nec- 
essary or desirable, for our sustenance and comfort. 
It is the true teacher's duty to fit the child thus to 
win its happiness ; and such a teacher has ever pres- 
ent to his mind the question : How am I to perform 
this duty ? What sort of teaching and training am I 
to give to the subjects of my care? Let us endeavor 
to find some direction to guide us to Nature's answer 
to this question. 



TEACHING AND TRAINING. 



TEACHING AND TRAINING. 

WHETHER we regard private schools or public 
schools, boarding or day schools, we find that 
much which goes on at them aftbrds an important les- 
son, not as to what to follow, but what to avoid. 

Is there any thing worthy of the name, of con- 
fiding intercourse between teacher and pupil known 
upon this continent, or to extend our inquiry, we 
may say, known anywhere ? Here and there excep- 
tional instances will be found, as we have before said, 
both in this country and in Europe, of men and wom- 
en devoted to their noble profession, between whom 
and their pupils there has grown up the strongest 
bond of parental and fraternal affection. To these 
teachers the pupils run in every difficulty for its so- 
lution, in every danger for protection ; but with these 
exceptions the teacher is looked upon as a task-mas- 
ter, sometimes even as a spy ; the tasks set to be 
shirked as much as possible, the observation of the 
teacher to be eluded and deceived. 

Lesson-time over, the children resort to their tame 
animals, to their weaving-machines, their wind-mills 
and dams ; to their gardens, kites and ships ; to 
swimming, rowing, foot-ball, marbles, leap-frog, base- 
ball and cricket. In the practice of these games, 



20 Teaching and Training. 

skill, dexterity and knowledge are acquired of whicb 
the pupils appreciate the utility, and enjoy not only 
for present, but for anticipated future use. 

Natural History, to be taught in school and made 
a reality, by following the guide given us by nature 
in the amusements to which children resort of their 
own accord, should be a prominent subject of instruc- 
tion and training in the school. Cultivating the fac- 
ulties of observation and of analysis, it should be 
among the earliest subjects of instruction, and, at th^ 
same time, of amusement. 

But they ought not to be taught from books ; na- 
ture and the teacher are the only books to be em- 
ployed until considerable progress has been made by 
the pupils. It is so easy to procure the things them- 
selves for the study of botany ; an abundant supply 
of wild flowers can be so readily obtained, sufficient 
to enable each child to be supplied with specimens 
for examination and dissection. The interest of the 
children in their study can be so easily awakened 
and sustained by the judicious teacher, the difficulties 
of the supposed hard words of scientific names disap- 
pear so readil}^, that the real difficulty is to under- 
stand how so obvious a subject of instruction is either 
wholly banished from the schools, or sought to be 
taught only from books, without any reference to liv- 
ing nature. 

The variety and multiplicity of insect life affords 
ample opportunity for the study of that branch of 
natural history — and entomology would be found not 
less beautiful and interesting than botany; the de- 
lightful excursions in which teachers and pupils 
would join for the gathering of objects of natural his- 



Teaching and Training. 21 

tory would at the same time serve to strengthen the 
bond of affection which should exist between them. 
The nature of his own body and the functions of his 
various organs will soon interest the pupil, and along 
with instruction therein he would learn the qualities 
of the different kinds of animal and vegetable sub- 
stances in use for food, their relative value and im- 
portance in building up his body ; he would learn to 
compare the food now in use with that which was 
employed by our ancestors, and what has given rise 
to the adoption of the new and abandonment of the 
old ; the methods of cookery best adapted to each 
kind of food, and what kinds of food are suitable for 
particular ages and states of health ; what material, 
vegetable or animal, is most suitable for clothing, sep- 
arately or in combination. He would learn to com- 
pare our present style of clothing with that adopted 
in past ages; he would learn the history of the 
changes which have been adopted, and while feeling 
desirous of retaining such as have been wisely adopt- 
ed, might learn from past experience to desire to re- 
turn to some good habits as to clothing which have 
been abandoned. 

The tight-fitting garments in which we unhealthi- 
ly clothe our bodies, a fashion for which we are in- 
debted to the use of armor ni times when the chief 
occupation of man was mutual slaughter, and the 
great object of desire to secure protection against hos- 
tile weapons, might some time come to be discarded 
for the more healthful practices of the ancient Asiat- 
ics and Komans, if a general knowledge of the un- 
healthfulness of our present practices should come to 
prevail. 



22 Teaching and Training. 

The necessity and meaning of light and cleanli- 
ness, the indifference of the human body to all natu- 
ral changes of temperature, when strengthened and 
maintained in health by wholesome food and efficient 
bathing, might lead to the taking of effective meas- 
ures to restore the old Eoman bath to general use. 

As regards shelter, why a building on the ground 
is generally to be preferred to a cave or shelter in the 
ground — what materials are best adapted for roofs, 
what for walls, floors, windows, why we use stone or 
brick in one part of the country and wood in anoth- 
er ; what sizes, shapes, means of warmth and ventila- 
tion, for privacy and social enjoyment, should be 
adopted, and as regards furniture and utensils, what 
are most suitable for the several parts of a dwelling ; 
what should guide our selection of material, fabrics, 
shape, size and pattern ; how to establish a communi- 
cation from one part of a building to another; how 
water and light are to be had most readily. All 
these things should form the subject of school study 
and inquiry. 

The means of locomotion, how streets, roads and 
paths should be laid out and maintained ; the con- 
struction and use of carriages, cars, wagons, tramways, 
railroads, ships, steamers, propelling power; where 
bridges should be built, and how ; viaducts and em- 
bankments to cross valleys, cuttings and tunnels to 
penetrate hills and mountains; these, too, simply at 
first, and afterwards in more elaborate detail, should 
form subjects of school instruction, the rules determin- 
ing the selection of each and the methods of their 
construction not being preached in lectures, ex Cathe- 
dra, but evolved by a patient questioning of nature. 



Teaching and Training. 23 

by experiment and the Socratic method of inquiry. 
Exercise of the limbs under the direction of a skilled 
mstructor, so that all the muscles of the body may be 
duly trained, and a healthy body built up to support 
a healthy mind. The kinds of recreation to be se- 
lected, whether bull-baiting, cock-fighting, rat-catch- 
mg or prize-fighting, should be preferred to games of 
skill and strength, to the drama, literature, works of 
art, public walks, gardens, and museums; the com- 
parative influence of all these upon the health, 
strength, courage, activity, humanity, refinement and 
happiness of society ; how people may be led to pre- 
fer such as tend to general well-being to those which 
have a tendency to brutalize and debase. All these 
also should be dwelt upon in the school. 

How stores of food, of clothing, of fuel and of the 
materials for building may be collected and pre- 
served; how present labor may be made to supply 
future wants, and the thought of future enjoyment be 
made to sweeten the present toil. How the means of 
instruction and of amusement may be secured. How 
all engaged in supplying one need of society co-ope- 
rate with all who are engaged in supplying its other 
needs. What form of government is best, and how 
it may be best administered. How upright judges 
may be secured, justice administered, and society pro- 
tected against internal and external foes. These and 
all the other subjects enumerated would, if handled 
by a true teacher, be found most attractive to chil- 
dren. 

The names given to the subjects at which we have 
glanced are: Natural History, the Mathematical and 
Phvsical Sciences in all their branches, Vegetable and 



24 Teaching and Training. 

Animal Physiology, the Political and Social Sciences; 
which should be presented in the order in which the 
attention and desire to learn could be aroused. 

It will hardly fail to strike the mind of the reader 
that nothing has yet been said about giving instruc- 
tion in the use of those tools for acquiring knowledge, 
reading, writing, ciphering and drawing. The true 
teacher will understand the omission. The com- 
mencement. of the instruction in reading, writing, ci- 
phering, drawing, and in spelling, would take place 
as part of the object lesson which should be adopted 
as the first step to knowledge, and should be retained 
m the most advanced classes as the most perfect 
method of applying the knowledge which has been 
acquired. It would soon be understood by the pupils 
that the power of reading, of writing, of designing 
and of calculating is essential to the acquirement of 
knowledge, and to any thing like extent and variety 
of information on subjects relating to individual and 
social well-being. The desire of acquiring this knowl- 
edge would quicken the faculties of the children, aug- 
ment their industry, and lighten the labors of the 
teacher to an indefinable extent. The teacher who 
should fail to impart a moderate degree of skill in 
these arts to most, and of excellence to many, at the 
same time that adequate progress was made in the 
study of the sciences we have named, should be 
deemed unfit for his profession, and not be allowed 
to relieve himself from disgrace by magnifying the 
difficulties of his task or by complaints of the idleness 
or want of capacity of his pupils. As children will 
take interest in what they learn in proportion to their 
understanding of its bearing npon their own hnppi- 



Teaching and Training. 25 

ness, and upon their actual life and surroundings, the 
knowledge of themselves as beings acted upon by 
surrounding objects and by their own kind, should 
be carefully imparted to them simultaneously with 
the knowledge of the qualities of the surrounding ob- 
jects destined to act upon them. 

Children thus worked upon by skilled and earnest 
instructors ; led to find out and observe the properties 
of that Nature of which they form a part ; their minds 
nourished by the enjoyment which follows the mas- 
tering of every difficulty, and the addition of every 
fresh item of knowledge to their previous store ; train- 
ed also in habits of healthfulness and of amiability ; 
will not only cheerfully give themselves to study, but 
will also seek to dignify by their conduct and to im- 
prove by practice the knowledge they progressively 
acquire, soon understanding, among other things, why 
they are sent to school and the importance of that 
education, part of which they are to acquire at school. 

As the object of the school-teaching should be to 
prepare the pupils for actual life, they should be made 
familiar with the idea that all their means of subsist- 
ence and enjoyment can only be obtained by labor; 
not only should their attention be called to the fact, 
but they should be made sensible how much skill, 
knowledge and labor and economy were needed for 
the creation of existing stores, and are needed for 
their maintenance in undiminished quantity; nor can 
this be done in any way more fitly or completely 
than by performing under their eyes, and causing 
them to take part in, the actual business of produc- 
tion. The well-ordered school is an industrial school, 
in which every industrial occupation, manufacturing 



26 Teaching and Tkaining. 

or agricultural, for the carrying on of which conven- 
ience can be made, should be successively practised by 
the children, under the direction of skilled workers. 

The farm, the factory, the shop, the counting-house 
and the kitchen, should each have its type in the 
school, and present to the minds of the children a pic- 
ture of real life ; while their practice would impart a 
skill and adaptability to the pupils which would in- 
sure their preparedness for all the vicissitudes of the 
most eventful life. 

Can any reason be suggested for adopting a differ- 
ent system of instruction for girls than that which 
shall be determined on as best fitted for boys ? We 
confess to our inability to perceive any — both are or- 
ganisms of the same all-pervading nature — to both 
the most intimate knowledge of that which skill and 
perseverance secure, seems to be desirable for their 
happiness, and that of all mankind. Of the two, per- 
haps, the greatest knowledge is needed for the wom- 
an, FOR HERS IS THE MORE IMPORTANT AND MORE 
PERFECTED ORGANISM ; to her is Committed the per- 
formance of the chief functions of the highest act of 
organized beings, viz., reproduction ; therefore, upon 
her knowledge and conduct, far more than upon that 
of the man, depends the future of the beings in whom 
she is to live again. ' 

Another great object with the true teacher, will be 
so to train the judgment of his pupils as to avoid that 
forming of unconsidered opinion which is the parent 
of prejudice and a chief obstacle to progress. Train- 
ed to investigate the foundations of every fact in na- 
ture and in science, to weigh the evidences on which 
they are asked to receive assertions, whether of a 



Teaching and Training. 27 

physical, moral or social nature, they will ever have 
a reason for the faith that is in them ; and will know 
how to SUSPEND JUDGMENT when the means of knowl- 
edge are insufficient. 

Such pupils will not be apt to form opinions either 
in physical science, politics, or industrial life, without 
having first thoroughly examined the bases of the 
opinions they form and express, while the preju- 
dices imbibed from nurses or parents, will be subject- 
ed to vigorous investigation, and either received as 
sound doctrine, or discarded as ill-founded and super- 
stitious. Of how many jDi'cjudices are we not the 
victims, without being ourselves in the least con- 
scious of the fact! Our political opinions, our social 
customs, are taken up like the fashion of a coat, with- 
out reason or reflection ; and habit and association, 
but too often hold us captive long after reason has 
pronounced her condemnation ; our minds have been 
warped from truth, and we fail to perceive our own 
deficiency, to recognize the mental dishonesty with 
which we are afflicted. All this will be averted in 
the case of those who in their youth are trained to a 
rigorous investigation of every fact presented to their 
minds, until the habit of truth, not merely of speak- 
ing and telling the truth, but that mental truthfulness 
which shrinks from accepting a falsehood for truth, 
and acknowledges ignorance rather than utter what 
is not assured — will become as much a part of the 
pupil's nature as is his desire for food. In short, he 
would be so trained as to feel as great a repugnance 
to plunge his mind into moral, as his body into ma- 
terial filth. 

Again, while ever merciful and pitying to the 



28 Teaching and Training. 

criminal, he would be intolerant of fiilsehood wherever 
it might be found ; and he would deem himself der- 
elict in his duty, as a man and as a citizen, did he 
leave corruption to rot and fester in the Common- 
wealth, because he and others like him would not 
take the trouble to raise their voices against wrong- 
doers ! 

What a different aspect would not this great city 
of New York offer to our inspection to what it now 
presents, had a generation been trained in the knowl- 
edge, and practised in the observance of their duties 
as citizens ! 

Did those merchants and traders, who, in their 
private dealings would scorn a lie, but recognize the 
duty they owe as citizens and as men of truth, they 
would, by uniting, soon sweep away the serious dis- 
credit to our country and to Kepublican Institutions, 
the festering corruption of this city and of the State ; 
yet it is to their supine, nay wicked tolerance of the 
evil that we owe the specimens of judicial corruption 
by which we are robbed and dishonored. Can it be 
said that any system of education can be sound, 
which shall fail to demonstrate, at least to the older 
pupils, their duties as citizens, to take an active, intel- 
ligent and upright interest in public affairs ; that 
shall fail to instruct them in the principles by which 
their judgments should be .guided, and lead them to 
discard every action in public affairs, which they 
would not approve in private life? 

"We must cease to live in books, in past mystifica- 
tions, in useless theories, in foolish and unprofitable 
discussions, in ancient ideas and customs, and grasp 
the living present with all the richness, fullness and 



Teaching and Training. 29 

beauty of its life. The cliemistry of nature, the work 
of her great hi,boratory, should be the study of youth 
as of age, instead of dead languages and the vain and 
foolish mythology of Grreeks and Romans wherewith 
at present we poison the minds of the young. 

" Can we take burning coals into our bosom and 
not be burned?" Can we suffer the impressionable 
minds of youth to be impregnated with the filth of 
the heathen poets in their imaginings of gods as dis- 
gusting as themselves, without staining the pure tab- 
let of the mind with spots and grossness, while the 
children acquire a distaste for that glorious nature 
whose volume should be their constant study ? 

We have to deal with the great present, with life, 
not with death — to promote health, physical and mor- 
al, not to propagate infectious sickness. The present, 
wisely improved, leads to a happy future, and is the 
only road to that goal. We can not jump the pres- 
ent and its duties and reach the future so as to enjoy 
it, neither can the dead past lighten the labors of the 
living present. There is a past which still lives and 
vivifies the present, but the quaint and filthy imagery 
in which the ancient priests disguised from the pro- 
fane — from all but the initiated — the mysteries of 
their lore, can be of small account to a people whose 
great duty is the dissemination of light and truth. 

Every thing that has any relation to man's com- 
fort and well-being, or to his happiness as a social be- 
ing, that it is, and not the dead past that we should 
learn, and of the things that affect us most nearly we 
should learn first. What did the ancients know of 
steam, of electricity, of the material elements of na- 
ture, of her forces? And little as we know, how 



30 Teaching and Training, 

much of tbut little could be learned from a lifelong 
study of ancient lore? If there be auglit of value in 
the laws of ancient Rome which has not been trans- 
lated into our native tongue, let it be translated ; 
but let not our youth waste precious years in learn- 
ing to play upon an instrument (Greek or Latin) 
which when learned can give forth no sound. But 
if we turn to Nature and to her grand volume, we 
there find all the knowledge man can acquire. From 
her study, too, we can learn a lesson, not perhaps 
among the least imjjortant, as to the limits fixed by 
nature to human knowledge. To know of a surety 
what those things are which never can be known to 
mortal man, is a knowledge, the want of which has 
driven many to puerile and superstitious practices, 
and many more to madness and despair. 

From the great book of Nature, God's book, is to 
be learned the principle of justice, of love, of wisdom, 
of truth ; and as the germ of justice is developed in 
the mind, the mind is brought in contact with the 
Great Fountain, absorbs a portion of its light, en- 
larges, develops, becomes stronger, assimilates to it- 
self the essence of the great Godhead, and renders 
man godlike. 

So with each of the other faculties ot man ; each 
draws its nourishment from its special Fountain. 
Wisdom, love, justice, and truth sliould preside; and 
if judgment, sympathy and conscientiousness be ju- 
diciously trained and developed, they wnll help to de- 
velop harmoniously all the other faculties. But to 
this end they, and each and all of man's faculties, 
must be brought into a wholesome, natural contact, 
each with its proper food ; and by natural we mean 



Teaching and Training. 31 

not that contact which might peradventure happen if 
left uncared for, but such as the nature of the faculty 
demands for its development in due harmony, to pro- 
duce the greatest amount of happiness to its possessor. 
To supply this food, to bring to each faculty its prop- 
er aliment, is the business of the true teacher. If we 
desire a child to be truthful, we must bring it in con- 
tact with truth, and bring it to love truth by causing 
its practice to inure to the child's enjoyment. If we 
wish it to be wise, we must bring its mind in contact 
with wisdom, exercise its analytical powers, and train 
its judgment; let it see sound judgment producing 
happiness; let it see how beautiful and desirable is 
the possession of wisdom, and the child will soon 
learn to seek it for its own sake. 

To chastise a child for speaking that which is un- 
true may fill it with fear, but does not make it love 
truth. The love of truth and of wisdom must be cul- 
tivated as we cultivate the love of music. " Seek me 
early, and ye shall find me." " Knock, and it shall 
be opened unto you." That which the mind seeks it 
will find. The natural relationships are established, 
and it is only for us to work in harmony with, and 
not obstruct or interfere with them. It is the "true 
relationship of things " we need to learn. There is 
nothing in us that is not in nature. All the forces 
developed in man are but developments of nature ; 
and all the forces required for his nourishment and 
strength exist in the bosom of Nature. Matter, 
light, heat, electricity are not produced by him. In 
nature they exist ; remove any one of them and he 
perishes. To Nature then must. we ever turn as the 
reservoir of nourishment and as the teacher, by the 



32 Teaching and Training. 

study of whose volume we learn all of wisdom that 
can be known of mortal man, or that can tend to his 
well-being; and her true relationships must be the 
constant object of our search. Before the knowledge 
of her true relationships disappear superstition and 
fear and mystery. The lightning's flash, the thun- 
der's roar, the falling meteor and the sun's eclipse 
cease to terrify and alarm. Witches, hobgoblins and 
demons come no longer to trouble us ; the most un- 
usual phenomena awaken only philosophical research 
and curiosity. And what is true of the full-grown 
man is not less true of the child. 

That school wherein children above the age of in- 
fancy fail to assist the teacher in his instruction, is an 
ill-ordered school. It is not the subject, but the 
teacher who is uninteresting; he scolds, worries and 
punishes his pupils, when he himself is the fitter sub- 
ject for the lash. He awakens the sense of fear 
which should lie dormant, while the other faculties 
of his pupils slumber in spiritless inactivity. 

As the object of education is to prepare children 
to enter successfully and happily into life, and wisely 
to discharge all the duties devolving upon them as 
they unfold into men and women, and occupy the 
sphere assigned to them, the simple rule for the 
course of instruction seems to be, that they should 
learn those things in the order in which they can be 
received by the child's mind, which most vitally af- 
fect their well-being and happiness. 

As only a healthy, well-developed body can af- 
ford a home to a healthy, well-developed mind, phys- 
ical culture claims early and constant attention, and 
should receive that careful regard to which the truth 



Teaching and Training. 33 

contained in the well-known aphorism : " We are 
fearfully and wonderfully made," entitles it. The 
teachings of the sciences of Pathology and of sanita- 
ry science should be judiciously and carefully eluci- 
dated, practically and theoretically ; presented step by 
step to the mind of the child ; and the child's body 
and mind should be carefully trained, so as to de- 
velop all its' physical and mental powers in harmo- 
ny. Gymnasiums for the body, conducted by men 
who have made themselves masters of anatomy and 
physiology, should be an essential feature in every 
school, so that ignorance and the desire to excel may 
not lead to putting a strain upon the system calcu- 
lated materially to injure organs which need careful 
and judicious development. Plays, games, dancing, 
marching and the gymnasium all require the careful 
supervision of a teacher well versed in a practical 
knowledge of the human system, and thoroughly ap- 
preciative of the great truth, "We are fearfully and 
wonderfully made." But the foundation for the 
school as for the life career must be laid at home, and 
much as the teacher can do, he can never supply de- 
ficiencies resulting from the want of a well-ordered 
home or of a healthy home training. Never, save 
under necessity, should the parent yield up his sa- 
cred duty to another, at least during the tender years 
of childhood. 

The education of the heart and of the affections, 
is as essential as the school education, and these can 
never be so well cultivated as under the influence of 
home. All must be developed in order to maintain 
the true equilibrium. The boarding-school is not 
the place for children to attain a sound moral devel- 

3 



34 Teaching and Training. 

opmcnt, and tLc sooner parents generally understand 
this truth, the better for their children, for them- 
selves and for society. As well uproot the flower, 
or shrub or tree, and expect it to flourish, as to cut 
the child off from the influence of home, and the care 
of a loving mother, father, brother and sister, and 
hope that the sympathetic faculties of its mind can 
attain their just development. 

Physical culture, heretofore neglected among us — 
the body being left to grow up as it may happen or 
chance — will form a prominent feature of training in 
every well-ordered school. All the muscles of the 
body will be in turn exercised, developed. The an- 
cient Greeks afforded us here also a wise example, 
which we have signally failed to imitate. 

Let us secure for our children all the advantages 
we can from an enlightened and natural system of 
education, and do all we can to perfect both mind 
and body. How often is the cry repeated, " Mamma, 
tell me a story," and mamma, tired and wear}^, says 
she is too busy, or, for the want of a better, tells over 
again for the hundredth time, "Little Eed Riding 
Hood," or some other equally foolish or more in- 
jurious tale, such as Bluebeard or Cinderella. An- 
ecdotes of great men, suitably arranged, events in 
history and biography, carrying with them valuable 
and important morals, will afford all the amusement 
the child desires, without developing a love for the 
marvellous and false, which leads it away in infancy 
from the simple, truthful, and natural. If children 
are to be taught to think naturally and truthfully, we 
can not begin too young, and it is the dut}^ of par- 
ents to remember that Valentine and Orson. Cinder- 



Teaching and Training. 35 

ella, Bluebeard, and such stories, are a web of false 
and exaggerated statements that will, and do pro- 
duce injurious effects upon the child's mind. The 
story of Aladdin's Lamp has made many a child de- 
sire to enjoy wealth without labor, and has exerted a 
most pernicious, though unsuspected, influence upon 
his future. Children, not less than men, seek an easy 
road to the objects of their desires ; and while works 
of imagination are to be by no means discarded in 
mental training, such should not be selected as give 
false notions of the busy and industrial life into 
which the child is to be introduced. Even in the 
choice and use of the finest works of fiction, the 
greatest caution is necessary. The little one can 
hardly distinguish between a fable that amuses it, 
and a lie told to shield it from punishment. If it 
hear nothing but truth, it will know nothing but 
truth ; and. a truthful mind is a glorious thing to be- 
hold in children as in men. " An idle brain is the 
devil's workshop ;" therefore let there be no idle 
brains, but let all work usefully and pleasantly. 
Usefully we say, for even amusement is useful. We 
live in a world of use, in a world of beauty, a world 
that can be greatly improved, and human happiness 
largely increased, according as we avail ourselves of 
the knowledge already acquired for the right teach- 
ing and training of the 3^oung, so that they may 
grow up and develop into happy, self-supporting 
men and women, diffusing happiness to all around, 
themselves happy in proportion to the happiness 
they cause. 



THE SCHOOL. 



THE SCHOOL. 

UPON the organization and arrangement of tlie 
school largely depends the success of the educa- 
tor. Two things must be borne constantly in mind. 
First, to create truthful and intellectual atmosphere, 
where wisdom, honor, and knowledge can be inhaled 
as with the breath, and second, to make the school 
cheerful and attractive in every way possible. We 
must get rid of the idea now generally prevailing 
among children, that the school is to be resorted to 
with regret and escaped from with pleasure. 

So soon as the child will look at and become in- 
terested in pictures and toys, and will listen to tales 
and little stories, it can profitably be introduced in 
the school, the first department of which should be 
the Infant-school, or, as the Germans so aptly term 
it, the children's garden, or Kinder Garten. 

Here plaiting, modelling, and building, with simple 
object lessons for the older infants, develop their pow- 
ers of observation, and give employment and impart 
skill to little fingers which might else be engaged in 
destroying furniture or clothes, or in pilfering from 
the sugar-bowl. Practical familiarity with the prop- 
erties of lines, angles, circles, spheres, cylinders, cubes, 
cones, and the conic sections will be acquired, which 



40 The School. 

will give a life and reality to the geometrical stud- 
ies which will occupy them in their school career. 
Dancing and singing will relieve the tedium of sit- 
ting, shake off the surplus energy, give rest to the 
bod}^, and power, time, and tune to the voice. Mod- 
els of houses, stores, workshops, kitchens, farms, and 
factories, which later on they will assist in making, 
will be a source alike of amusement and instruction. 

In the children's garden no teacher should have 
charsre of more than about twelve children, who 
should regard her as their mother-teacher, while she 
should seek to win the love and confidence of the lit- 
tle ones as the beginning of her work. 

Each class of twelve should have their own special 
room, while for general purposes, such as music, drill- 
ing, gymnastic exercises, games, tableaux, and exhi- 
bitions of the magic lantern, the oxyhydrogen micro- 
scope, the stereopticon, and the like, they should as- 
semble in a large hall. The details of arrangements 
will readily suggest themselves. The main feature is 
to have all things natural, free, pleasant, cheerful, 
bright, refined, and unrestrained by external forms or 
rigid rules, at the same time that order is secured by 
an easy discipline. 

So deeply are we impressed with the importance 
and utility of the kinder garten, and with the high 
qualities required by the teacher of the very young, 
that we are more and more disposed to believe that 
the true order in rank and promotion among teach- 
ers should be, to speak in paradox, downwards; that 
is to say, the younger the children to be taught, the 
higher the rank and remuneration of the teacher ; for 
not only is an extensive range of knowledge neces- 



The School, 41 

sary to enable the teacher truthfully to answer the 
innumerable questions of inquisitive infancy, and to 
avoid giving false notions, to be afterwards with great- 
er or less difficulty removed — always with a shock to 
the moral sentiment when the child discovers it has 
been deceived — but also a knowledge of the infant 
mind, a perception of the thoughts and fancies which 
chase one another through the infant brain, a know- 
ledge and perceptive power which only a watchful 
and loving experience can acquire. An industry and 
a patience far beyond any needed by the teacher of 
more advanced pupils are also required by the highly- 
cultivated men and women, to whom alone the train- 
ing of infant minds should be intrusted. Advanced 
pupils go more than half-way to meet their teacher — 
the infant can render no assistance to his, all has to 
be borne, suffered and done for him — his future hab- 
its depend mainly on those given to him in his earli- 
est years. Yet the care of him in these important 
days is generally confided to ignorant nurses and to 
the less-skilled class of teachers. 

In building the school, a pleasing style of architec- 
ture should be adopted, and the walls of the main hall 
should be hung with diagrams of all kinds, illustrative 
of natural history in its largest sense, of the sciences 
and of the mechanical arts, and with portraits or busts 
of distinguished men. The walls of the class-rooms 
should be decorated with diagrams and maps and fig- 
ures referring to the special branches taught therein. 

A.large and commodious laboratory should be fit- 
ted up in the building, to enable every pupil to ac- 
quire experimentally that knowledge of chemical 
forces and action which books alone can never im- 



42 The School. 

part. A convenient observatory should afford facili- 
ty for astronomical study and observation. 

On the top floors or around the building should 
be arranged workshops, where the use of tools and 
machinery could be taught. The classes should as- 
semble in the large hall, in the morning, where they 
might join in singing or light gymnastic exercises, or 
listen to some short appropriate address before betak- 
ing themselves to their class-rooms. 

The teaching in these latter should be conducted, 
wherever practicable, upon the Socratic method, and 
every branch of science and of art could be thus ex- 
plained. The mother unconsciously uses this method 
in educating or drawing out the first perceptions of 
infancy and early youth ; and the impressions derived 
from this method of acquiring knowledge are the most 
lasting, being such as become most absolutely assimi- 
lated with the pupil's mind. The teacher would also, 
at frequent intervals, conduct his class into the fields 
and woods for the study of botany, entomology, and 
geology, where Nature would supply in abundance 
the materials, and the teacher would be the only book. 
Instruction in the various trades which could be con- 
veniently practised should receive attention, the taste 
of the pupils being made a guide to selection. 

Some portion of the teaching which goes on in 
school should be performed by the pupils, under the 
supervision of the teacher. No adult can so thorough- 
ly enter into a child's mind as can another child; nor 
is this the only reason. 

That is not fully known which can not be thor- 
oughly used and applied, and knowledge can not be 
applied which its possessor can not himself impart. 



The' School. 43 

A perfect illustration of this truth is furnished us in 
the training of the soldier. 

Upon nothing, perhaps, have the knowledge and 
skill of the most powerful intellects been more con- 
centrated than upon the science and art of mutual 
slaughter ; and in establishing the soldiers' drill, an 
exhaustive analysis of the means by which the de- 
sired object was to be attained has been pursued. 
The men whose intellects have developed that drill, 
have not been content to treat the soldier as a pupil 
only. Each recruit has in turn to teach, as well as to 
learn to practise what he has learned, by drilling oth- 
ers whom he is made temporarily to command, as 
well as to practise his drill under the command of his 
officer ; for only by such means could the highest de- 
gree of efficiency be secured. The reasons which led 
to the adoption of this principle in the barrack apply 
equally to the school. 

This principle of giving and receiving we also see 
exemplified in Nature. Animals inhale oxygen from 
the air and return carbonic acid, which serves to build 
up the structure of the plant, and the latter in its turn 
gives out oxygen to supply the consumption of ani- 
mals. 

Every day — in the middle of the day, in winter, 
in the summer, early in the morning, or in the even- 
ing — gymnastic training on the system of the Swed- 
ish anatomist Ling or of the German Turners would 
form a portion of the curriculum, for which conven- 
ient apparatus would be provided. 

Biography should form an important feature in 
the course of reading, its subjects being arranged in 
groups; and the true glory of a Washington, a Ben- 



•14 The School. 

tham, a Stevenson, a Morse, and a Cobden distin- 
guished from the false glare and tinsel of a Louis 
XIV. and a Marlborough. 

Music, both vocal and instrumental, would be 
taught to all, but only those more gifted by nature 
would be educated to perform solo. Nearly all per- 
sons can be trained to sing part-music pleasantly and 
intelligently, and to perform moderately on some in- 
strument. The cultivation of the musical faculties 
harmonizes the mind, and affords a never-failing 
source of solace and recreation. The attempt to con- 
vert all persons into solo performers, and the hypo- 
critical applause with which their discordant notes 
are indiscriminately greeted, deprives society of the 
pleasures which part-music well performed would af- 
ford, by encouraging all to attempt what they arc 
pretty sure to do badly, to the exclusion of what they 
would be equally likely to do well. 

"We have reserved for the last, to enumerate what 
is, perhaps, the most important of all the subjects of 
instruction. 

To ALL children, so soon as they can be promoted 
from the lander garten — perhaps even to the higher 
grades therein — instruction in the conditions of hu- 
man well-being, and in the phenomena and arrange- 
ments of social life should be given, and should be 
continued throughout their school career. 

What ! teach political economy to children ? Even 
so. It will be conceded, that to teach the future la- 
borers the laws by which the wages of their labor 
will be regulated, how high wages may be secured 
and low wages prevented — to teach the future capi- 
talists the laws by which their profits will be deter- 



The School. 45 

mined, how large profits may be secured, and loss, 
failure, crises, and panics avoided — must be a desira- 
ble, if it be a practicable thing. Is it practicable? 
The experience of twenty years has proved that it is. 
The experiment has been tried by Mr. Wrn. Ellis, the 
wise and noble founder of the Birkbeck schools of 
London, England, who not only devoted his surplus 
means to the endowment of true schools, but gave 
also his time to instruct in the principles of the sci- 
ence of human well-being — alike the poor children 
by whom his schools were attended and the children 
of the Queen of England, He also instructed and 
trained a corps of teachers, professional and volun- 
teer, and by one of the latter a class was conducted in 
the winter of 1867, '68 at the Normal School of this 
city of some 35 to 40 teachers engaged in the practi- 
cal work of teaching in our common schools, who, 
under his guidance, became, after a short course of 
some twenty or more lessons, enthusiastic advocates 
for the introduction of this study into the schools; 
for not only does it teach the conditions of industrial 
success, but it is also a science of morals and of ethics 
far more worthy of the attention it has never yet re- 
ceived in this or, indeed, in any country, than that 
which is given to what goes under the name of moral 
teaching and training. It is by gradual steps — by 
the employment of the Socratic method of instruction 
— with a rare use of text-books, that the most intri- 
cate problems of this science can be unfolded to pu- 
pils with such effect that a child of fourteen or fifteen 
years of age, who shall have passed through a course 
of four or five years' instruction, would put to the 
blush, with few exceptions, alike the members of both 



46 The School. 

houses of the United States Congress and of the Brit- 
ish Parliament. 

A museum and a library would be necessary ad- 
juncts to such a school as we have described. It 
would need but a few seasons to get together in the 
various excursions taken by pupils and teachers, 
quite a collection of botanical, entomological, and geo- 
logical specimens. These would serve as objects for 
illustrating the teacher's lessons, and tor examination 
by the pupils. The drying, preservation, and arrange- 
ment of plants, animals, and minerals, in which the 
pupils would assist, would serve to impart to them a 
skill and dexterity, which they would know how to 
value, and would be eager to acquire, and, together 
with their frequent visits to the museum, would serve 
to cultivate a love of nature and devotion to the stjady 
of her works. 

The library, besides containing treatises on science 
and for reference, would be filled with books of trav- 
els, and the nobler English and foreign classics; the 
books would be loaned to the pupils as in ordinary 
circulating libraries, and a pleasant reading-room 
would be furnished with the better class of periodi- 
cals and newspapers. 

To be deprived for a time of the right to visit the 
museum or reading-room, or to borrow books from 
the library, would be one of the severest punishments 
known in the school. 

It is hardly necessary to say that the selection of 
the principal of such a school as we have indicated 
is among the most difficult problems of its establish- 
ment. His qualifications should be as near the per- 
fection of manhood as can possibly be found. Invited 



The School. 47 

by a large and generous salary (to be dependent, be- 
yond a stated sum, on the number of the pupils), it is 
to be hoped such a teacher could be found. 

Such a principal, after a fixed period of probation, 
should not be removable except on a very large vote 
of the proprietors of the school to that effect, but his 
office should be vacated on his attaining the age of 
60 or 65 years. The selection of teachers to assist 
him in his duties should be left to himself The re- 
muneration of the assistant teachers should also be 
large, and should be such as not only to enable them 
to live in comfort, but to make ample provision for 
their future when the age of labor shall have passed. 

The chief position in society should be assured to 
the principal and his assistants by the proprietors of 
the school. 

The visits of the former to the houses of the latter 
should be regarded as an honor, the greatest respect 
and deference should be paid to them, and the pupils 
should be taught to look upon them with love and 
respect next only to that they pay their parents. 

The best investment a parent can make of his 
wealth is in the proper education of his children. 
Life is not merely to be born, to grow, to eat, to drink, 
and breathe. Noise is not music. Life is such as we 
take it and make it, or rather as it is taken hold of 
and made for us by those to whom the care of our 
youthful days is intrusted. 

Let us endeavor to picture to ourselves the being 
likely to be produced by a system of teaching and 
training, continued for successive generations, such as 
we have indicated above. Let us imagine the full 
development of the most complex of nature's organ- 



48 The School. 

isms — a part of the one living organism of the Uni 
verse, the latest product of her laboratory ; consider- 
ed, as a part of the great Cosmos, the most perfect, 
yet but an integer in the whole ; the ultimate devel- 
opment of nature's chemistry, yet forming an atom 
of her living unity ; combining and possessing the 
widest relationships, even embracing therein the en- 
tire volume of that nature whose true relationships 
comprise all knowledge, truly " the noblest study of 
mankind." Let us try and draw the picture of the 
developed man ! 

Eobust and supple of limb, symmetrical of shape, 
his muscles swelling beneath their healthy develop- 
ment; with head erect, conscious of his strength and 
skill, which he puts forth for the protection of the 
weak, and for the purpose of drawing from nature 
her bounteous stores ; free from sickness or disease, 
in harmony with nature, at peace with his fellow-men, 
possessing a competent knowledge of nature's laws, 
and guiding his conduct to be in accord therewith, 
"sitting beneath his own vine and fig-tree," "blessed 
in all the works of his hands," and diffusing blessings 
and happiness around. Such is the picture of the 

HEALTHY MIND IN" A HEALTHY FRAME, which it is in 

man's power to procreate and rear ! 



APPENDIX. 



APPENDIX. 

Department of Public Instruction, j 

Corner of Grand and Elm Streets, r 

New York, Jime 5th, 18G9. ^ 

To Magnus Gross, Esq., 

Chairman of the ^'■Executive Committee for the Care, Government 
and Management of the College of the City of Xew York:" 

Dear Sir, — I have observed with surprise, and with a 
sense of deep regret, that the proposition is entertained 
by a large number of the Trustees of filling the chair of 
Latin and Greek, now vacant, and even of establishing 
separate chairs for each, at the College of the City of 
New York ; involving, with the necessary tutors, an out- 
lay of not less than $20,000 per annum. The subject in 
all its bearings is one of too vast importance to be treat- 
ed in the ordinary method of discussion by the Com- 
mittecj and I therefore beg leave to place my views in 
writing, to insure their receiving more matured consid- 
eration than oral observations could secure, 

I pass over the question (on which considerable dif- 
ference of opinion exists) as to the propriety of sustain- 
ing at all, at the enforced expense of the public, an edu- 
cational institution to supply the needs w^hich the Col- 
lege of the City of New York is intended to meet. The 
College exists by law ; we are its guardians, and the only 
question we have to consider is, how most efficiently and 
most economically to secure the attainment of the ends 
desired by the Legislature. 

These ends we shall no doubt all agree to be — first : 
that any of the youth of this city possessed of special 
talents, but lacking means for their cultivation, may 
have placed within their reach an education the best 
possible for the development of their powers for the 



52 Appendix, 

benefit of themselves and of the community ; and, second, 
to provide for the comparatively well-to-do the means of 
pursuing useful studies in compensation for compelling 
them to provide for the instruction of their less fortu- 
nate citizens. 

As it is self-evident that Avhatevcr course of studies 
will tend to secure the first of these ends will tend also 
to secure the second and less important, we are spared 
the necessity of a two-fold investigation. 

A very few statistics suffice to show that neither of 
these ends has been hitherto attained by the College of 
the City of New York. 

It is immaterial what year we select for examination, 
the numbers which follow will be found to bear about 
the same relative proportions in every year. I quote 
from the Trustees' Report for 1866 merely because it is 
the latest document at hand which furnishes the num- 
bers in the different classes and of the graduates ; from 
this report I find, that while there were three hundred 
and eighty-one students in the introductory class, only 
twenty-five graduated in that year. The number of 
graduates in 1867 was thirty, and twenty-nine in July, 
1868. Of the three hundred and eighty-one who com- 
posed the introductory class in 1866, one hundred and 
fifty-one left the College during the year, and doubtless 
the two hundred and thirty who remained will have 
dwindled to about twenty-five or thirty by the year 1871. 

Without doubt some propoi'tion of the three hun- 
dred and eighty-one leave the College because of the 
necessity they are imder of obtaining, by their labor, 
the means of subsistence ; but when it is remembered 
that these three hundred and eighty-one are the piched 
youth from the many thousands attending the pi(blic 
schools, and when the sacrifices and pi'ivations which 
men and youth imbued with a love of learning M-ill 
make and undergo for the acquirement of knowledge 
are borne in mind, we must look to something in the 
constitution of the Colleire itself to account for this re- 



Appendix. 53 

suit. In short, we can but come to the conckision that 
the main cause of this falling off is to be found in the 
feeling which grows upon the pupils and their guard- 
ians, of the comparative uselessness of the studies to 
which they are consigned. 

Let us examine the course of studies, as given from 
pages 8 to 14 of the Report of the Board of Trustees for 
the year 1866, or from pages 24 to 28 of the Manual of 
the College. 

The first observation which must strike the mind of 
every thinker is the fact that the primary analysis— the 
main classification which has been adopted of studies 
which ought to be framed to fit the students for " com- 
plete living " — is one of " words," i. e., the tools of knowl- 
edge, instead of knowledge itself. Or in the words of 
the Report : " There are two courses of studies— ancient 
and modern— differing only in the languages studied," 

On examining the course for the introductory and 
freshman classes, a feeling of astonishment must fill the 
mind at the marked want of wisdom by which it was 
dictated, but which at the same time affords a sufficient 
explanation for the abandonment of the College by its 
students. 

Even if "■toords^"' ought to be the real object of edu- 
cation, it would be supposed that Enghsh words would 
be more useful to a people whose mother-tongue is Eng- 
lish, than the words of any other language ; yet the stu- 
dents of the introductory and freshman classes of the an- 
cient course receive instruction y^^^e hows a toeek through 
both terms in Latin and Greek, and one lesson per week 
during one term in the English language. The stu- 
dents of the modern course substitute for Latin and 
Greek the French and Spanish languages. 

I purposely abstain from saying any thing as to the 
method of instruction, which is the converse of that 
adopted by nature, and as a consequence signally fails. 
This has been so forcibly put by President Barnard, of 
Columbia College, that I need only refer the mt-mbers 



o-i Appendix. 

of our Committee to liis essay on " Early Mental Train- 
ing, and the Studies best fitted for it." 

What steps are taken, to familiarize the students of, 
say the freshman class, with that great nature of which 
they form a jiart ? What, for instance, do they learn of 
the structure of their own bodies, and of the means of 
preserving health ? One lesson a loeek is given on Phys- 
iology and Hygiene, and that is all ! The fear of making 
this letter too long compels me merely to refer the Com- 
mittee to pages 40 to 42 of Mr. Herbert Spencer's chap- 
ter on " What Knowledge is of Most Worth," in his 
work on Education, in farther illustration of this sub- 
ject, instead of making extracts from it as I would oth- 
erwise like to do. 

Attention, it is true, is paid throughout the college 
coiirse to mathematical studies, yet very little to their 
practical application ; while to Chemistry, the parent of 
modern physics, the manual (which is our guide) pre- 
scribes two lessons per week to the introductory class, 
and to the freshman, sophomore, and junior classes abso- 
lutely none at all! Mining, Mechanical Engineering, 
Architecture, Theoretical Agriculture, Biology, and Bot- 
any are utterly ignored ; and no branch of Zoology is 
even mentioned in the curriculum. We next come to 
a science more important, because universal in its appli- 
cation and in its need than any other, viz. : The Science 
of Human Well-being, commonly called Political or So- 
cial Economy. Here, too, like exclusion ! except that 
in the sophomore class, for one terra, one hour per week 
is given to it. That is to say, a people who are to live 
by labor are left by the guardians of their education in 
ignorance of the laws by Avhich the reward for that labor 
must be regulated; they who are to administer capital 
are to be left to blind chance Avhether to act in accord- 
ance with those laws of nature which determine its in- 
crease, or ignorantly to violate them ! 

Restrained again from quotation by the fear of weary- 
ing the Committee, permit me to refer them to the lee- 



Appendix. 55 

ture of Dr. Hodgson, delivered at the Royal Institution 
of Great Britain, on " The Importance of the Study of 
Economic Science," which will be found in the work of 
Professor Youmaus, on " The Culture demanded by 
Modern Life." 

I confess to a feeling of deep discouragement at the 
perusal of such a record as that presented by the course 
of studies at the College of the City of New York, es- 
pecially when I find that this is the state of things a 
large number of the Trustees seem desirous of perpetu- 
ating. My views on this subject are confirmed by the 
following remarks found in President Barnard's Essay 
on " Early Mental Training, and the Studies best fitted 
for it." 

"Whatever may be the vahie of the study of the classics in a sub- 
jective ]5oint of view, nothing roidd possibly more thoroughly unfit a man 
for any immediate usefulness in tliis matter-of-fact world, or make him 
more completely a stranger in his oivn home, than the jiurely classical 
education which used recently to be given, and which, with some shght 
improvement, is believed to be still given by the universities of Eng- 
land. This pro])osition is very happily enforced by a British writer, 
whose strictm-es on the system appeared in the London Times some 
twelve or thirteen years ago. 

"Common things are quite as much neglected and despised in the 
education of the rich as in that of the poor. It is wonderful hoiv little 
a young gentleman may know when he has taken his university degrees, 
especially if he has been industrious, and has stuck to his studies. He 
may really spend a long time in looking for somebody more ignorant than 
himself. If he talks vdth. the driver of the stage-coach that lands him 
at his father's door, he finds he knows nothing of horses. If he falls 
into conversation \x\t\\ a gardener, he knows nothing of plants or flow- 
ers. If he walks into tlie fields, he does not know the difference be- 
tween barley, rye, and wheat ; between rape and timiips ; between 
natural and artificial gi*ass. If he goes into a caq^enter's ,yard, he does 
not know one wood from another. If he comes across an attorney, 
he has no idea of the difference between common and statute law, and 
is wholly in the dark as to those securities of personal and political lib- 
erty on which we pride om'selves. If he talks with a countiy mag- 
istrate, he finds his only idea of the office is that the gentleman is a 
sort of English Sheik, as the Mayor of the neighboring borough is a 
sort of Cadi. If he stroUs into any workshop or place of manufactiu-e, 
it is always to find his level, and that a level far below the present com- 
pany. If he dines out, and as a youth of proved talents and perhaps 
university honors is expected to be literary, his literature is confined 
to a few popular novels — the novels of the last centiuy, or even of the 
last generation — histoiy and poetry having been almost studiously omit- 
ted in his education. The girl who has never stirred from home, and 



56 Appendix. 

whose education has been economized, not to say nei/kcted, in order to send 
her oivn brother to c.olh/e, knows vastly inoie of those things than he 
does. The same exposure awaits him wlierever he goes, and whenever 
he lias the audacity to oi)en his month. At sea he is a landlubber; in 
the country a cockriey ; in town a greenhorn ; in science an iynoravius ; in 
business a simpleton ; in pleasure a ?HiW-so/)— everywhere out of his ele- 
ment, eveiyvvhere at sea, in the clouds, adrift, or by whatever word 
utter ignorance and incapacity are to be described. In society and in 
the work of life, he finds himself beaten by the youth whom at college 
he despised as frivolous or abhorred as profligate." 

Take the preparation of our youth for their duties as 
citizens. Here, again, a knowledge of poUtical and social 
economy is indispensable. We have seen the attention 
it receives ; and while two lessons a week for one hour, 
and that only to the senior class in its last term, are 
given to American citizens on the Constitution of the 
United States and on International Law, 7ione lohatever 
is giveji on the science of Government throicghoict the 
entire course of Jive years ! 

I might go through the whole course of studies with 
similar results. Here and there, in this or that class, a 
small amount of attention is given to some of the sci- 
ences omitted in the other classes ; but the entire record 
is one of the most disheartening character. 

Words ! loords ! engross almost exclusively the atten- 
tion of the students from the hour they enter the Col- 
lege until they leave it ; and it is not to the five-and- 
twenty graduates the palm of useful industry should be 
awarded, but to the many who, in discouragement, aban- 
don a course which tends to imfit them for the great bat- 
tle of life ! 

What, then, are the reasons generally assigned for 
this perverse conventionalism of devoting the time of 
youth to the acquirement of dead words, to the unavoid- 
able exclusion of nearly every thing that is of value? 
First, we are told that we can not understand the Eng- 
lish language without a knowledge of Latin, from which 
it is derived. The inaccuracy of this pretension is at 
once made manifest by reference to Webster, where he 
states : 



Appendix. 57 

' ' That English is composed of — 

" First. Saxon and Danish words of Teutonic and Gothic origin. 

"Second. British or Welsh, Cornish and Amoric, which may be 
considered as of Celtic origin. 

" Third. Norman, a imxture of French and Gotliic. 

" Fourth. Latin, a language formed on the Celtic and Teutonic. 

" Fifth. French, chiefly Latin corrupted, but with amixture of Celtic. 

" Sixth. Greek formed on the Celtic and Teutonic, with some Coptic. 

"Seventh. A few words directly from the Italian, Spanish, German, 
•and other languages of the Continent. 

" Eiijiith. A few foreign words, introduced by commerce, or by po- 
litical and literary intercourse. 

"Of these, the Saxon icords constitute our inother-tongtte, being 
words which our ancestors brought with them from Asia. 

" The Danish and Welsh also are primitive words, and may "be con- 
sidered as a part of our vernacular language. They are of equal an- 
tiquity with tiie Chaldee and Syiiac." 

Biit even were it true that our language was derived 
from the Latin, wherein Hes the difficulty in the way of 
the teacher explaining to his pupils the meanings of the 
parts of English words which are of Latin origin, with- 
out the necessity of the pupil's acquiring the same knowl- 
edge by the roundabout process of learning one thousand 
words he will never need, for one that may at some time 
be to him of some service as a mnemonic ? 

Driven from this position, the advocates of " classi- 
cal'''' studies tell us that the study of Latin and Greek 
serves as a training for the intellect. Unquestionably 
the exercise of the faculties of the mind serves to develop 
the faculties so exercised; yet if this were the object to 
be attained, Hebrew, nay, Chinese, would be preferable to 
Latin ; but sciENce develops the same faculties, and far 
more efficiently. The facts of science to be stored up 
in the mind are so infinite in number and magnitude 
that no man, however gifted, could ever hope to master 
them all, though he were to live a thousand years. But 
their arrangement in scientific order not only develops 
the analytical powers of the mind, but exercises the mem- 
ory in a method infinitely more useful and powerful than 
the study of any language. Finally we are told classical 
studies develop the taste. If then to this the advocates 
of such studies are driven, its mere announcement must 



58 Appendix. 

suflicc to banisli Latin and Greek from all schools sup- 
ported by taxation ; for however essential it may be to 
provide the means of the best possible instruction, it is 
as absolutely out of the sphere of the Trustees of Public 
Moneys to provide, at the public expense, so mere a lux- 
ury as on this hypothesis Latin and Greek must be, as 
it would be to jjrovide the luiblic with costly jewels ! 
But even for the cultivation and development of art and 
taste, SCIENCE is the true curriculum ! 

He who is ignorant of anatomy can not appreciate 
either sculpture or painting ! A knowledge of optics, of 
botany and of natural history, are necessary, equally to 
the artist or to the connoisseur ; a knowledge of acous- 
tics to the musician and musical critic. " No artist," 
says Mr. Spencer, " can produce a healthful work of 
whatever kind without he understands the laws of the 
phenomena he represents ; he must also understand how 
the minds of the spectator or listener will be affected by 
his work — a question of psychology." The spectator or 
listener must equally be acquainted with the laws of such 
phenomena, or he fails to attain to the highest aj^precia- 
tion. 

I now come to the last and most serious aspect of 
this question, and I fearlessly assert that classical stud- 
ies have a most pernicious influence upon the morals and 
character of their votaries. 

It should not be forgotten that Greeks and Romans 
alike lived by slavery (which is robbery), by rapine, and 
by plunder; yet we, born into a Christian community 
which lives by honest labor, proj^osc to impregnate the 
impressionable minds of youth with the morals and lit- 
erature of nations of robbers ! 

This letter has already extended to so great a length 
that I am compelled to abstain from making extracts 
from the works of the greatest thinkers, which I had de- 
sired : and I can now but cite them in support, more or 
less pronounced, of the views above put forward, viz. : 
President Barnard, of Columbia College, who with rare 



Appendix. 59 

honesty and boldness has spoken loudly against the con- 
ventional folly of classical studies ; Professor Newman, 
himself Professor of Latin at the University of London, 
England ; Professors Tindall, Henfry, Huxley, Forbes, 
Pajet, Whewell, Faraday, Liebig, Draper, De Morgan, 
Lindley, Youmans, Drs. Hodgson, Carpenter, Hooker, 
Acland, Sir John Herschell, Sir Charles Lyell, Dr. Se- 
guin, and, rising above them all in educational science, 
Bastiat and Herbert Spencer. To a modified extent, 
the name of Mr. John Stuart Mill may be quoted — for 
he loudly advocates science for all — science, which is un- 
avoidably excluded by the introduction of, or at least 
the prominence given to, Latin and Greek in our College. 
Mr. Mill, it is true also, advocates classical studies, but 
for certain special classes which exist in England who 
have no regular occupations in life. 

Neither is it without importance as a guide to our- 
selves to observe that in the very best school in this 
country — a school perhaps not surpassed by any in the 
world, viz., the Military Academy at West Point — nei- 
ther Latin nor Greek studies are permitted. 

If now, in any career whatever, any use ' could be 
found for Latin, it must be in that of the professional 
soldier, to whom, if to any one, the language and litera- 
ture of the most militai-y people the world has ever seen, 
should be of some service. But no ! the wise men who 
framed the curriculum of West Point, though they knew 
that the study of the campaigns of the Romans would 
be serviceable to their students, provided for their study, 
not by the roundabout method of first learning a lan- 
guage which could never be of any other use, but by 
the direct method of the study of those campaigns! 
Are the pupils of West Point generally found deficient 
in intellect ? Is not, on the contrary, the fact of having 
graduated at that school a passport to the higliest scien- 
tijic and pra^ctical employment ? 

Our duty to the peof)le is clear ; let us neither waste 
the precious time of our youth on worse than useless 



60 Appendix. 

studies, nor the money of the citizens on worse than use- 
less expenditure. 

I do earnestly hope that our Committee will give to 
my observations their most serious deliberation. Let 
us come to no hasty conclusion on this subject : accus- 
tomed as we have been to hear constantly repeated such 
conventional jjhrases as that " Latin and Greek are es- 
sential to the education of a gentleman ;" that " classical 
studies are indisjoensable to a liberal education ;" to hear 
applauded to the echo orators who have introduced into 
their speeches quotations of bad Latin or worse Greek 
by audiences of Avhom not one in one thousand under- 
stand what was said. We have been apt to receive such 
phrases as embodying truths, without ever examining 
their foundations. I respectfully urge the Committee to 
consider well before they act, to study the reasons as- 
signed by the great thinkers I have named for condemn- 
ing, as, humbly following in their wake, I venture to 
condemn, as worse than mere waste of time, the years 
devoted to Latin and Greek studies. 

Let lis endeavor to make the College of this city 
worthy of the city and of the state; let us cast aside 
the trammels of mediaeval ignorance, and supply to the 
pupils of the College " the culture demanded by modern 
life." Let us in this, the first important matter Avhich 
has come before our Committee, act in harmony and 
without prejudice, for the welfare of the College and 
"for the advancement of learning," and so prove our- 
selves worthy of the sacred trust we have assumed. 
I am, dear sir, very truly yours, 

Nx\THANIEL SANDS, 

Member of " Tfce Executive Committee foi- the Care, Gov- 
ernment, and Management of the College of the City 
of Nero York.'" 



The Philosojihi/ of Teaching, 



THE TEACHER, 

THE PUPIL, THE SCHOOL. 

By NATHANIEL SANDS. 

8vo, Cloth, $1 oo. 



An interesting and valuable" work, in which the science of teaching 
is treated in a philosophical and practical manner, and a sketch is 
given of a school to be established on the principles developed in his 
pages. Mr. Sands takes the view that education, mental and physi- 
cal, is but the absorption of surrounding elements into the mind and 
body — an arrangement and assimilation of materials so as to incor- 
porate them into the being to whose nourishment they are applied, 
just as the tree or plant assimilates to its growth and subsistence the 
materials which it draws from the air and the soil ; and his theory 
of teaching is based on these truths. — N. Y. Tunes. 

He advocates a radical change in the system of teaching youth. 
He proposes a school where pupils shall be taught by illustrations 
from nature as well as from books ; where the museum, chemical 
laboratory, and workshop shall find a place ; where, in short, the 
mind of the learner shall not be forced, but shall have just the kind 
of food suitable for its age and development. — N. V. World. 

Much has been written upon education — much that is both wise 
and thoughtful, and much that has been but sound. Among the 
most thoughtful and suggestive recent writings is an unpretentious 
work bearing the title of " The Teacher, the Pupil, the School," by 
Mr. Nathaniel Sands. Small as it is, it contains more ideas than 
many bulky volumes. — iV. V. Trihuie. 



2 Sands's Philosophy of Teaching. 

The question with which he mainly concerns himself is whether 
Latin and Greek, and certain other branches, shall be taught to the 
exclusion of more practical studies. He thinks that what is com- 
monly known as the " culture demanded by modern life " — chemistry, 
mining, anatomy, natural history, political and social economy, the 
science of government, etc. — should take the place now usurped by 
classical studies. Mr. Sands believes in making no compromise be- 
tween the useful sciences and the classics. He condemns " as worse 
than mere waste of time the years devoted to Greek and Latin," and 
would bar them out altogether. — Jourjial of Comtnerce. 

Mr. Sands, who has just been appointed one of the new Board of 
Education, has long heen known as an advanced thinker on the sub- 
ject he is now called upon to deal with. He has published a pam- 
phlet on the Philosophy of Education. — N. Y. Sim. 

We have in this compact and unpretentious treatise a great deal 
of pith and acumen, brought to bear upon a most important subject 
— that of educational first principles. Mr. Sands has gone to the 
base of human teaching, discarding pretentious themes, in order to 
illustrate the simpler beauty of that eductive and inductive co-rela- 
tionship which, beginning at the mother's breast, proceeds through 
all the quiet processes of mental development in infancy, childhood, 
and maturity. — N. V. Dispatch. 

His hints may well arrest the attention of thoughtful men. — N. V. 
Tribune. 

We commend it to the thoughtful consideration of all, but espe- 
cially of our public men. * * * Commissioners of Schools and oth- 
ers charged with youthful training may advantageously consider the 
reflections. — N. Y. Eveiiinsr Post. 



HARPER & BROTHERS, Publishers, 

Franklin Square, New York. 



C^^ Harper & Brothers will setid tJie above work by inail, postage pre- 
paid, to any part of tlie United States, on receipt of Ji oo. 



Works on Education 

PUBLISHED BY 

HARPER & BROTHERS, New York. 



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of Five Cents, or they may be obtained gratuitously on 

application to the Publishers personally. 



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